All this week, we have run the two mayoral candidates' responses to questions on six issues of vital importance to Philadelphia: education, public safety, race and diversity, neighborhoods, government reform and jobs. The questions were developed by participants in the Citizen Voices project. Today's issue is jobs, which spurred this question from the Citizen Voices participants:

"Citizens have expressed concern that neither of you has the charisma, warmth and creativity to match Ed Rendell's skill at forming partnerships with businesses and with other levels of government. Why should we have confidence in your ability to form these important relationships?"

Below are John Street's and Sam Katz's responses.

John Street: I am very different from Ed Rendell in many ways.

Over the years, Ed and I often laughed at the partnership struck between a Jewish guy from upper- middle-class New York and a black guy from a farm in Norristown, who had neither electricity nor running water in his home until he was 11 or 12 years old. We successfully partnered together through trying times because we both were committed to the city's success. It was nothing new for me. Even before Ed Rendell became mayor, I worked with Republican and Democratic leaders from state and local government to craft the Philadelphia Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority legislation that provided the groundwork for the city's fiscal recovery.

Because of my unique vantage point as the twice unanimously elected president of City Council, I have a very keen sense of what it took Ed Rendell to move Philadelphia forward over the last seven years. Those who see only the charisma and warmth diminish Ed's contribution. It took grueling hours of hard work. It took tough and often painful decision-making. It took leadership. The charisma and warmth are significant only if there is something to cheer about!

Having said that, I do understand the significance of promoting Philadelphia as an exciting and fun city to visit and in which live, and the mayor's role in doing so. Every Philadelphian - including me - took a wacky pride in William Penn in a Flyer's uniform and Phillies hat (Midge's idea, not Ed's)! I will not have Ed Rendell's style. I will have my own - I am, after all, the creator of the Campaign Polaroid Posse.

Finally, I will not stand alone in managing the city in the coming years. I will bring to local government the very best talent from across the country to implement my bold $250-million plan to eliminate blight and stabilize neighborhoods, to increase by 500 officers the number of police on the streets fighting drug trafficking, and to reform local government as we move into the 21st century.

Sam Katz: Just look at the relationships I have formed during this campaign: endorsed by mayoral candidates (and former City Council colleagues of John Street) John F. White Jr. and Happy Fernandez. Endorsed by a broad spectrum of the gay and lesbian community. Broad support from civic activists in the city's poorest neighborhoods.

Then look at my involvement with City Council members and civic leaders, with whom I began working when I managed Bill Gray's first campaign for Congress in 1976. Add the business leaders with whom I worked when I served on the school board, and the boards of the Academy of Natural Sciences and the Police Athletic League.

Couple this with more than two decades in private business, where I helped build the nation's most successful municipal finance company. I recruited top talent, supported marketing, training and product development initiatives and helped foster a creative, entrepreneurial and profitable environment in which others prospered.       

Often my projects required building public consensus to allow them to go forward. This experience and these relationships, plus those that I enjoy with officials in the surrounding counties and in Harrisburg, ought to reassure every Philadelphian of my ability to form solid working partnerships to achieve real results.